General Tips on Using Computers
- Master computers or they will master you.
Computers will
be part of your life from here on out. So you'd be wise to take
advantage of the opportunity your college education provides you to
become fluent with computer use. This is especially true if you (like
me) find computers annoying and difficult and you'd just as soon avoid
using them; the best way to protect yourself from computers is to learn
how to make them do your bidding.
- Don't wait to the last minute to figure out how to do
something you need to do with computers
As
a general rule it always takes longer than you expect to figure out
computer stuff, and if you're tense and in a hurry it will take longer
still. So give yourself time to master things well in advance.
(Malfunctioning computers are not
a legitimate reason for late assignments anymore.) Don't wait until the
night before a paper is due to figure out how to upload it to the
instructor. Don't wait until the moment you plan to do an electronic
reading to figure out how to print it out. Don't try to learn how to
make footnotes in Word as you're typing up the final draft of your
paper that's due in two hours.
- Learn computers in general, not just one computer and one set
of programs.
It's tempting, once you've figured out how to get email working on the
computer in your dorm, to just stick with what works and not learn
other ways to get your email. That's fine until your computer breaks or
the network on your floor goes down and you desperately need to get at
your course email. So learn
several ways to get your email or print out a paper from a floppy.
Experiment, try different computers and programs, learn pine>, learn linux
(the customized dune buggy of operating systems). It's like learning
how to change a tire on your car or how the furnace works; some day on
a lonely road or a cold night, that knowledge might come in very handy.
- Make backing up your files as automatic as looking both ways
before you cross the street.
You should always back up your files, of course, because computers
break and because people screw up; the first time you lose a night's
(or a month's) work because you didn't back something up you will want
to kill yourself. So, always back up, and make it a habit. Always make
sure you always have at least two digital copies of your work; if you
save your file on a floppy, always make sure you have two floppy disks
and regularly save your papers to both disks. If you don't know how to
back up on a particular system, learn how before you start working on
it. A computer that doesn't have a way to back up files is broken;
don't use it.